Jan Koster

Jan Koster (29 June 1943 — 3 April 2013) was a Dutch footballer, professional volleyball player, volleyball coach and pub owner. During his playing career he played as a libero for 16 years in the Dutch Volleyball League, being a key person for the teams he played with. 

Koster didn’t accept the offer to play for the national team. Although not playing for the national team, Koster was named as one of the best volleyball players of Drenthe in the 1970s and possibly one of the best ever Dutch libero players.

During his best years he was nicknamed due to his good technique  (translated: Jan with the golden hands) or  (translated: Jan with the velvet hands).

Biography
Af young age Koster played both volleyball and football. As a footballer he played with Asser Christelijke Voetbalvereniging and made his debut in the first league at the age of 16. Two years later he didn’t want to combine football and volleyball and chose, also because of his friend, for volleyball.

He played a total of 16 seasons in the Dutch volleyball league. He started playing with SUES and he played afterwards with SFC in Assen. Koster was a key person for the team.  After Hans Zaaijer and Jelke Smit left the club, Koster also left SFC in 1973 and became player and trainer with Oranje Nassau in Groningen. He also started studying economics in Groningen. The team was very dissatisfied that he left, also because negotiations had already been done with him. However, he returned as coach at SFC for the women’s team. He trained the women’s team for three seasons until 1977. He was successful with the team. He stopped because he couldn’t combine it anymore with his job as pub owner. He was from 1981 coach of Lycurgus, replacing .

During his career Koster played for the national student team and the national militairy team. He was invited, but didn’t accept the offer to play for the main national team.

Koster worked as a gymnastic teacher. Koster took over pub “Havenzicht” in 1975 together with volleyball player Piet Swieter, but short after it became his own cafe. The cafe was a well known meeting place for (known) volleyball players, basketball players and other sportspeople. Koster had a room above Havenzicht but lived somewhere else.

Koster died in 3 April 2013. Koster was described after his death by coach of the 1996 Olympic winning team Joop Alberda as “legendary”.Joop Alberda at Twitter, 7 April 2013 After his death, Havenzicht was closed after almost 150 years in July 2020.

References

Category:1943 births
Category:2013 deaths
Category:Volleyball coaches
Category:Footballers from Drenthe
Category:Dutch volleyball players
Category:People from Assen